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I strongly disagree. I worked at an analytics company that had and needed a privacy ethics department. They were great. It was a mix of lawyers, philosophers (d

I strongly disagree. I worked at an analytics company that had and needed a privacy ethics department. They were great. It was a mix of lawyers, philosophers (degree in the subject), and former developers. They consistently thought about the nuances of baking privacy into a product in a way that I didn't have the background or time for. Every time I worked with them, they helped me build a better product by helping me tweak the specs in a way that had minimal impact on our users (unless they were a bad actor) and strongly increased privacy protections. It was like having a specialized PM in the room

m-ee 4y ago
I don’t remember the source but there was a linked article here a while ago about how to effectively manage “blockers” like this. The example given was a med device company where the engineers hated the regulatory department who always told them no. Manager decided to actually increase engagement and bring on one person from the reg side to their meetings. At some point a person said “well we’d love to do this but no way would the FDA allow us to do it.” The regulatory employee basically said “do you even know the regulations? There’s a very easy pathway to doing exactly that.” My boss once did a similar thing with the quality department. Suddenly we sailed through our DFMEAs. Some people do live to block others, but some are trying to do an important job. Engagement usually pays more than just whinging.
strix_varius 4y ago
> Every time I worked with them, they helped me build a better product by helping me tweak the specs in a way that had minimal impact on our users (unless they were a bad actor) and strongly increased privacy protections. It was like having a specialized PM in the room It sounds like they were focused on building product too, then, which is not at all what this is about.
mariojv 4y ago
What did the philosophers do on a day to day basis? I am curious, sounds like an interesting role.
- ajcp 4y ago
  I would think they'd more accurately be described as "ethicists" and probably fulfilled a function closer to a Business Analyst. Reviewing and transmitting requirements, gathering use-case data, reviewing standards & procedures, and working on "fit and function" type stuff.
- mind-blight 4y ago
  They all did the same thing, they just came to it from a different background. The day to day was reading the comms for a bunch of projects, finding places where you could be valuable, then reaching out to a bunch of project owners and convincing them to talk to you about the project. I had them reach out once because I was working on a project that dealt with data for school children. We were exploring to see if we could use data help teachers intervene early and prevent bullying. They reached out to make sure we understood the legal implications of dealing with data for minors, and that we weren't just building a product that would encourage the administration to pigeonhole students. After a brief conversation we got signoff and some great feedback on how to support positive outcomes while avoiding the risk of creating something that felt Orwellian
Kiro 4y ago
> philosophers Sounds like something from Silicon Valley, the TV show.

m-ee 4y ago

I don’t remember the source but there was a linked article here a while ago about how to effectively manage “blockers” like this. The example given was a med device company where the engineers hated the regulatory department who always told them no. Manager decided to actually increase engagement and bring on one person from the reg side to their meetings. At some point a person said “well we’d love to do this but no way would the FDA allow us to do it.” The regulatory employee basically said “do you even know the regulations? There’s a very easy pathway to doing exactly that.” My boss once did a similar thing with the quality department. Suddenly we sailed through our DFMEAs. Some people do live to block others, but some are trying to do an important job. Engagement usually pays more than just whinging.

strix_varius 4y ago

> Every time I worked with them, they helped me build a better product by helping me tweak the specs in a way that had minimal impact on our users (unless they were a bad actor) and strongly increased privacy protections. It was like having a specialized PM in the room It sounds like they were focused on building product too, then, which is not at all what this is about.

mariojv 4y ago

What did the philosophers do on a day to day basis? I am curious, sounds like an interesting role.

ajcp 4y ago
I would think they'd more accurately be described as "ethicists" and probably fulfilled a function closer to a Business Analyst. Reviewing and transmitting requirements, gathering use-case data, reviewing standards & procedures, and working on "fit and function" type stuff.
mind-blight 4y ago
They all did the same thing, they just came to it from a different background. The day to day was reading the comms for a bunch of projects, finding places where you could be valuable, then reaching out to a bunch of project owners and convincing them to talk to you about the project. I had them reach out once because I was working on a project that dealt with data for school children. We were exploring to see if we could use data help teachers intervene early and prevent bullying. They reached out to make sure we understood the legal implications of dealing with data for minors, and that we weren't just building a product that would encourage the administration to pigeonhole students. After a brief conversation we got signoff and some great feedback on how to support positive outcomes while avoiding the risk of creating something that felt Orwellian

Kiro 4y ago

> philosophers Sounds like something from Silicon Valley, the TV show.